"A year ago this week, Pensacola experienced an unprecedented hundred-year storm event. More than twenty inches of rainfall resulted in widespread flooding and significant damage both to private homes and public infrastructure. My staff and I were on the ground as soon as the rain stopped, working to assess the damage and assist affected residents. We quickly put in place a three-pronged recovery plan, working to repair 100% of the City’s damaged infrastructure, to build it back stronger than it was before, and to invest in new infrastructure to help prevent future flooding. Throughout the process, we’ve worked closely with FEMA and state officials, but early on, I made the decision that Pensacola couldn’t afford to wait for FEMA to begin our recovery. I authorized repair work to begin immediately in the most severely-affected areas such as Piedmont Road. Our efforts have been grounded in the reality that stormwater doesn’t care where the City ends and the County begins. We hired former County Administrator Bob McLaughlin to coordinate efforts between the City and County and find grant dollars for joint projects. We completed four engineering studies to help us fully understand both our challenges and the available solutions. Throughout the recovery process, we’ve documented everything online at cityofpensacola.com/recovery. Updated at least once a week, our recovery page includes all the relevant facts, figures, and documents, including a map of recovery projects and their status. Of the 77 recovery projects we identified, 52 have been completed. Piedmont Road has been fully reconstructed, and nearly all of the other damaged streets and sidewalks have been rebuilt. The heavily-damaged Vickery Neighborhood Resource Center is slated to reopen this fall. Leveraging a $2.7 million FDOT grant, construction is currently underway on a new regional stormwater management facility at Pensacola International Airport – the largest stormwater project ever constructed in the region, serving a drainage basin of more than 2,000 acres. While our work is far from complete, we have a clear path forward. Working jointly with Escambia County and our engineering consultant ARCADIS, we have developed the Pensacola Bay Eastern Sub-Basin Action Plan, a comprehensive set of project and policy recommendations. We are moving forward with many of the Action Plan’s recommendations, and we’re aggressively competing for grant dollars to do more. The Action Plan serves as the foundation for the nearly $200 million that the City and County are currently competing for in the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s National Disaster Resilience Competition. Next month, I will ask the City Council to move Pensacola from a 25-year to a 100-year flood design standard, a step recommended by the Action Plan and which Escambia County is taking simultaneously. I will also be asking the Council to award a bid for construction of the Government Street Regional Stormwater Pond at Corrine Jones Park, a landmark project funded by a $2.1 million grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation. This project will be similar in size and scope to the award-winning Admiral Mason Park pond along Bayfront Parkway. A year removed from last April’s flooding, I’m incredibly proud of the progress we’ve made. If there’s a silver lining in this unprecedented storm, it’s that it brought about unprecedented resolve and collaboration. The City and County are working together more closely than ever before on comprehensive and cooperative strategies. The reality is that we are an old city, and our infrastructure is aging. Streams and creeks which long ago served as natural drainage have been covered over. Pensacola’s drainage and stormwater issues can’t be solved overnight – but they can and they will be solved. We will continue to work hard, we will continue to invest in our infrastructure, and together, Pensacola and Escambia County will meet this challenge."